Farmers “confused” about climate change – Audio
How farmers feel about climate change
Paul Mitchell, agricultural economist
Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics
UW-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences
pdmitchell@wisc.edu
(608) 265-6514, (608) 263-3964
3:07 – Total Time
0:17 – Confused about climate change
0:40 – What the survey asked
1:46 – How farmers may respond
2:24 – Implication of farmer attitudes
2:39 – Wisconsin farmers uncertain
Transcript
Sevie: Paul, give us a sense of how farmers are feeling about climate change.
Paul: They’re confused, a lot of them. And the issue is politicized. Some farmers are very clear they don’t believe in climate change, that it’s not happening, that it’s not human caused. But a large chunk of the farmers were ‘no opinion’ is how they responded. We offered them this ‘I’m not sure’ option on the survey and I was surprised at the number who marked that option.
Sevie: Paul can you give us a thumbnail sketch of your survey?
Paul: Yeah, we focused on asking farmers their perception, their beliefs about climate change. In particular we focused on do you believe that climate change has been scientifically proven? I believe that human activities are causing climate change, how do you feel about that? And then the last one was, I believe that weather cycles explain the changes we’ve seen in the climate. The first one about scientifically proven or not on climate change, a lot of farmers were unsure. They marked the no opinion. Some were strongly saying no it hasn’t been proven; others were strongly in the other direction, yes it has been proven. A lot of farmers were very sure it has not been scientifically proven, yet they believe normal weather cycles explain a lot of changes they’ve seen in the climate. So, they think there’s something going on. I guess my feeling is that farmer’s are much more interested in weather than climate they deal with how is the weather doing this week, this month, this year, this crop season. They’re less willing to say this is climate change but they are willing to say this is what happens in agriculture.
Sevie: And Paul what kind of responses did you get in terms of how they may respond in climate changes?
Paul: In terms of how they would adjust to say, more extreme weather. I would say they plan on adjusting the crop mix, maybe changing their planting dates or what they’re growing and when. Adjusting their business arrangements, their leasing arrangements, how they’re going to deal with that. And then relying on crop insurance to help them deal with that extra variability so that their income flow stays more steady. Most farmers are not concerned about climate change affecting their yield or their yield variability. Their skeptics about the actual impact their day-to-day lives in the terms of crop production.
Sevie: Paul what implications do these attitudes have?
Paul: Farmers and rural landowners manage a huge portion of the US land and so any thing that is affecting how people are managing land, they are going to be involved heavily in that.
Sevie: Paul can you maybe parse out the Wisconsin responses?
Paul: From the Wisconsin side, more of our farmers were on the uncertain category regarding how valid climate change is from a scientific perspective. Wisconsin had more people willing to admit yes there is climate change from a scientific perspective or they’re unsure.
Sevie: We’ve been visiting with Paul Mitchell, Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, University of Wisconsin in the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, Madison, Wisconsin and I’m Sevie Kenyon.